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Personal Algorithmic Trading

A small personal trading bot run like an engineering project: capital you can afford to lose, written strategy and stop rules, paper trading first, daily checks, clean logs and a monthly review.

Free · Mac (Apple silicon) and Windows · v1.0.0 · Other platforms

Then open the Marketplace in the app, search for Personal Algorithmic Trading, and click Install. It goes into your own files, and works offline from then on.

Before you start: this plan is general information to help you organise your own money decisions. It is not financial, investment, tax or legal advice. Check decisions that matter with a qualified, licensed adviser in your country, and remember that investing and trading can lose money.

What it installs.

1

Pillar

1

Area

50

Projects

199

Starter tasks

🧮 Quantitative Finance & Trading

Personal Algorithmic Trading

Running a small personal algorithmic trading setup: strategy rules written down, paper trading first, only capital you can afford to lose, logs and a monthly review.

  1. Trading capital you can afford to lose
  2. One-page trading charter and weekly time budget
  3. Choosing a broker with API access for a small account
  4. Separate trading account and funding rules
  5. Written rule sheet for the first strategy
  6. Position sizing rule for a small account
  7. Written stop rule for the whole setup
  8. Home machine or cloud server for the bot
  9. Clean, documented trading environment
  10. API key and broker account security
  11. Market hours, holidays and order types sheet
  12. Pre-open bot health checklist
  13. Weekly position and cash reconciliation
  14. Monthly strategy review against the rule sheet
  15. Monthly broker statement and running costs tally
  16. Weekly error log review
  17. Quarterly backup and restore test
  18. Release routine for strategy code changes
  19. Annual review of the whole setup
  20. Weekly market data quality check
  21. Python essentials for a trading script
  22. How retail orders are filled and what slippage costs
  23. Margin, settlement and cash in your account
  24. First backtest of the rule sheet with costs included
  25. How many trades before results mean anything
  26. Reading list on why strategies fail out of sample
  27. Scheduling and supervising the bot process
  28. Free or paid market data for a personal setup
  29. Fee drag test at your real account size
  30. First live allocation at a fraction of planned size
  31. Rule for adding capital after a good run
  32. Second strategy only after the first meets its bar
  33. Cutting parameters and features from the strategy
  34. Phone alerts for fills, errors and silence
  35. Personal setup risk register
  36. First live trading day plan
  37. Three-month live versus backtest review
  38. Year-end performance file for the setup
  39. Broker outage and lost connection drill
  40. Holiday and travel plan for the bot
  41. Employer personal dealing policy check
  42. Part-time setup around a full-time job
  43. Guardrails for engineers building their first bot
  44. Keeping it small in or near retirement
  45. Household access note if you are unavailable
  46. Student setup on paper and tiny size
  47. Moving from end-of-day to intraday trading deliberately
  48. Small portfolio of uncorrelated personal strategies
  49. Round-the-clock markets with a personal bot
  50. Write-up of the setup without giving advice

Where it starts.

Each project arrives with its purpose, milestones and first tasks written out. Here is how the first three read.

Trading capital you can afford to lose

Decide, before any code exists, the single sum you could lose in full without touching rent, emergency savings, debt repayments or pension contributions. For most people with a personal setup this is a small slice of their savings, and writing it down now stops a losing month from turning into a top-up from money that already had a job.

First tasks

  • List monthly essentials, emergency savings and existing commitments on one sheet
  • Write the single sum you could lose in full without changing your life
  • Record the rule that the figure changes only at a quarterly check
  • Re-read the capital figure and its reasons before allowing any top-up @recurring(quarterly)

One-page trading charter and weekly time budget

Write down why you want to trade algorithmically, how many hours a week you can really give it, which markets are in and out, and what result after a year would make you continue or stop. Most strategies fail out of sample, so a charter that expects failure and treats the first year as tuition keeps the hobby from quietly eating evenings and savings.

First tasks

  • Write two sentences on why you want an automated setup at all
  • Set the weekly hours you can give it and the instruments you will avoid
  • Write the continue and stop criteria for the end of year one
  • Save the dated charter in the same repository as the strategy code

Choosing a broker with API access for a small account

Retail brokers differ widely in whether they offer an API, a paper environment, fractional shares, low minimums and clear fees, and switching later means rewriting the order code. Scoring three brokers on the same criteria, including how stable their API has been and how they treat small accounts, saves a painful migration in month six.

First tasks

  • Write the five criteria and their weights before reading any broker site
  • Score three brokers that offer both an API and a paper environment
  • Look up each broker on the financial regulator's public register
  • Record the chosen broker and the reason it won

Make it yours.

Install Personal Algorithmic Trading, then tell Aurum the date you're aiming for. It checks whether the plan fits the weeks you actually have.

Free · Mac (Apple silicon) and Windows · v1.0.0 · Other platforms

Blueprints are general information to help you organise your own work. They are not medical, financial, legal or other professional advice. See the Terms.